Chapter 1. The Parian Marble

1. Introduction

The Parian Marble is a monumental inscription written in Attic Greek on a stele that was originally over two meters tall, [1] dating from some time after 264/3 BCE. [2] It has reached us in two sections, ninety-three and thirty-three lines long. There is a gap of nineteen years between the sections, and the final thirty-five years are entirely missing. [3]

We have no information about the author. An Athenian origin would, perhaps, be the natural assumption, given the overall Athenian orientation of the text and the dating by Athenian archons. [4] Jacoby, however, noting the deviations from Attic usage, suggested that the author was a Parian or someone living in Paros, even though the stele contains no references to Parian history. [5] We know of two men who were involved with historical and literary research in Paros, Demeas and Mnesiepes, and both have been proposed as possible authors. [6] However, language and content are not enough for settling the question of origins, since an Athenian could follow local usage, and a Parian could adopt the point of view of Athens as a cultural center. [7] Perhaps it is best to leave the author of the Parian Marble anonymous. [8] We may still characterize him as an educated man with an interest in both history and literature who, if not a native, may have been living in Paros for some time before composing the chronicle. Jacoby further claimed that the author was not a professional historian or chronologist but rather a dilettante who put forward the results of his own reading. [9] Indeed, the inscription shows deficiencies from a chronographic point of view, such as departures from chronological orthodoxy and inconsistencies in the use of inclusive and exclusive computation. [10] We may well agree with Munro that the chronicle is “popular and superficial,” [11] while still considering it an example of the chronological knowledge typical of an educated man of the time. The author could have been one of the travelling historians attested at the time, who seem to have sometimes dealt with local history, if not a teacher, a poet, or a rhapsode. [12]

The surviving text does not illuminate the purpose for setting up the inscription. The opening is perhaps the most cited part of the chronicle, including the supplements that were given by Jacoby strictly exempli gratia. Let us look into the text without substantial restoration:

. . . [from / of / on account of] all sorts . . . I recorded the . . . , starting from Cecrops, the first king of Athens, until . . . uanax was archon in Paros, and Diognetus in Athens.

The text was the work of an individual, as the first person of the verb ἀνέγραψα, “I recorded,” indicates. That is, it was a private document, even if intended for public display (the verb means both “to register,” as well as “to set up in public”). [13] The scope of the inscription is clear from lines 2 and 3. The first line may have included the author’s name, or a general statement of sources and purposes. It is, however, extremely damaged, and not much can be gained from Selden’s transcription, with only twenty-five letters for the first line—that is, about a third of the line (assuming with Jacoby that it contained characters bigger than in most of the text). [14] Before ἀνέγραψα a complement with genitive, possibly ἐκ / ἐξ . . . παν[τοί]ων [ - - -]νων, may have indicated sources, provenance, or general subject (περί). Τhe nature of what is being inscribed is missing (τοὺς ἀν[), and possibly one line or more are missing at the beginning. [15] As for the lost end of the inscription, after reaching year 1, a closing section may have specified the motives for setting it up and the place where it was set, perhaps including a dedication, as Jacoby suggested from comparison with the philosophical inscription by Diogenes of Oinoanda (second century CE). [16]

2. The Discovery of the Parian Marble

The Parian Marble survives in two sections. The tale of their discovery and publication epitomizes the diverse ways archaeology and epigraphy were practiced in the early seventeenth and late nineteenth centuries. [17]

The story of the upper part of the inscription, known as A (Plates 1–2), begins at the crossroads of trade, diplomacy, and the Western European passion for collecting Greek antiquities. The stone arrived at the Earl of Arundel’s palace in London in 1627, along with other pieces of sculpted or inscribed marble (marmora). [18] John Selden (1584–1654) published them in a quarto volume in 1628, the MarmoraArundelliana. [19] The introduction to the first edition says little about where and how the Parian Marble was found, except that it was among the objects collected by William Petty, whom the Earl had sent to the East to collect antiquities. From the reference to the Parian archon in the opening part of the inscription, Selden rightly conjectured that it originated from Paros. Smyrna was first linked to the Parian Marble in 1641, when Pierre Gassendi (1599–1655) published a biography of his patron, the politician and polymath Nicolas-Claude de Peiresc (1580–1637). [20] Gassendi credits Peiresc as the first who found and bought the marbles through “a certain Samson, who took care of his affairs in Smyrna.” [21] According to Gassendi, when the marbles were about to be shipped, “I do not know by what stratagem of the sellers, Samson was imprisoned.” [22] Gassendi, however, emphasizes Peiresc’s gentlemanly reaction when he found out that the marbles were in good hands. Gassendi suggests that the sellers were to blame, but in his 1676 edition Prideaux made minor changes to Gassendi’s story by blaming the Turks (turcarum fraude) and noting that Petty bought the marbles for a higher price. Later editors, Boeckh (CIG 2374), Hiller von Gärtringen (IG XII.5 444), and Jacoby (1904a:vi) repeat a conflation of Gassendi’s story with Prideaux’s additions almost word by word. [23]

The “certain Samson” who seems to have been instrumental in collecting the Peiresc or Arundel marbles was Samson Napollon (1583–1633), a Marseille merchant who became a diplomat. [24] On a mission to Constantinople, he visited Smyrna at least twice, in 1624 and early 1625, and was officially appointed consul in that city. [25] Samson sent antiquities to Peiresc at some point, [26] but in the surviving correspondence with him there is no mention of the marbles or the imprisonment. [27] As for Petty, although it is not impossible that he obtained the Parian Marble in Paros itself while travelling through Greece, [28] he could as well have interacted with Samson after he arrived in Smyrna in the last months of 1624. [29] Still, we have only Gassendi’s testimony for the purchase of the Parian Marble at Smyrna. The city is not an improbable location, since at the time it was emerging as an important harbor for those travelling across the Mediterranean. If indeed the inscription was purchased in Smyrna, it may have been brought there from Paros either by or for any of those who were travelling at the time, collecting antiquities for individual patrons. The story of the upper section of the Parian Marble epitomizes to some extent the history of early European appropriation of antiquities.

Once in London, section A of the Parian Marble (Plate 1), along with the other “marbles,” was located in the garden of Arundel’s palace. When Prideaux published his 1676 edition, what was left of the Marbles had already been donated to Oxford University. [30] Prideaux mentions the neglect that the marbles suffered in the gardens of Arundel during the Civil War: some were damaged, some were stolen, and some were used for repairing the building. [31] By then, the upper part of section A, containing the first forty-five lines, was lost, [32] and the extant part was extremely defaced. [33] The inscription is nowadays displayed in the Ashmolean Museum. More than a hundred years ago, Munro still hoped that the lost part of the inscription might be recovered, [34] and perhaps so should we.

The second section of the stone, known as B (Plates 3–4), had a more straightforward history. Indeed, B never left Paros. It was found on a private property southeast of Paroikia in 1897 and was published the same year by Krispi, with a commentary by Wilhelm. The discovery confirmed the hypothesis that Paros was the place where section A had originated. The Archaeological Museum of Paros houses the bottom section of the Parian Marble to this day.

3. Scholarship on the Parian Marble

Early editions of the upper section of the Parian Marble (A) appeared in books devoted to physical collections of statues and reliefs, as well as of Greek and Latin inscriptions: the MarmoraArundelliana by John Selden (1628, 1629), and the MarmoraOxoniensia by Humphrey Prideaux (1676), Michael Maittaire (1732) and Richard Chandler (1763). [35] After Selden, scholars mostly exercised conjecture rather than autopsy. [36] Their editions were based on Selden’s transcription and (except for Chandler) they offered an incremental body of interpretation that summed up most scholarship on the Parian Marble current at the time. [37] In the eighteenth century, a few monographs discussed whether the Parian Marble might be a forgery. [38] The issue of authenticity, a forgotten chapter in the history of scholarship on the Parian Marble, was definitely settled with the discovery of section B. In the nineteenth century, section A of the Parian Marble was published in the then new and comprehensive corpora of inscriptions and fragments: by Boeckh in the Corpus Inscriptionum Graecarum (CIG 2374, 1843) [39] and by Müller in the Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum (1853). [40] The studies of Dopp (1883) and Flach (1884, including an edition) followed.

With the discovery of B in 1897, new energies were directed towards the Parian Marble, which could now be seen as a nearly whole text. John A. Munro and Friedrich Hiller von Gärtringen carried out autopsy of the Ashmolean and the Parian sections. [41] While Munro published his own notes in two articles (1901), [42] Hiller von Gärtringen provided the first critical edition of the complete Parian Marble in 1903, in the twelfth volume of the InscriptionesGraecae (IG XII.5 444). [43] Both scholars reported the difficulties in getting any good readings out of A. Jacoby himself saw only pictures of the inscription when he published his Habilitation thesis in 1904, [44] at the age of twenty-eight, but he profited from the work of Hiller von Gärtringen, Munro, and others. [45] Although Jacoby’s edition of 1904 was superseded by his own FGrH 239 (hereafter referred to as Jacoby’s edition), the authoritative critical edition until today, the former remains useful for its fuller list of parallel passages, its discussion of sources, and its more complete report of the textual tradition. Similarly, his companion article published in RheinischesMuseum in 1904 is still fundamental for such issues as the constitution of the text, the author and his sources, language, chronographic method, possible reasons for setting up the inscription, and possible locations.

English translations of the complete inscription are not readily available. At the time I began this project, only the English translation made by Gillian Newing for the Ashmolean Museum’s website was available, [46] whereas Robertson and Hewlett include only section A. [47] The situation changed with the recent publication of Burgess’s translation, [48] which addresses a non-specialist public, and will change further with the one expected to appear in Brill’s New Jacoby, for a more specialized audience.

No study of the Parian Marble has challenged Jacoby’s monumental contribution. After Laqueur’s comprehensive treatment in RE (1930), scholars have tended to focus on individual issues. Thus Chaniotis saw the inscription as an isolated example of epigraphical universal history and re-assessed the issue of authorship, rejecting Demeas and Mnesiepes. [49] He also argued against the location of the Parian Marble in the Archilocheion (see below). Rosenberger examined the issue of identities in the Parian Marble. [50] Clarke studied the inscription in the context of the ancient Greek chronographic tradition, pointing out the central role played by intellectuals and endorsing the location at the Archilocheion. [51] Ornaghi compared the Parian Marble to the Mnesiepes inscription, setting both in the context of the Parian cult of Archilochus. [52]

4. The Chronographic System of the Parian Marble

The Parian Marble records a variety of events and figures: the rise to power of rulers and states, battles fought, cities founded, temples built, games established, first victories at poetic contests, births and deaths of political and cultural figures. Information is given in entries with repeated formulae: “From when X happened, Y years, when Z was archon [or king] at Athens,” for example: [53]

From when Homer the poet appeared, 643 years, when Diognetos was king of Athens.

The opening of the inscription announces that the text has a definite time-span: from the kingship of Cecrops until the archonship of Diognetus in Athens and the archonship of an individual in Paros whose name ended in -υαναξ. [54] The archonship of Diognetus sets a time limit equivalent to the year 264/3 BCE. [55] The text counts down years between events in the past and that ending point, beginning from 1318 (equivalent to 1581/0 BCE). [56] As items progress, the number of years decreases. [57] The use of Athenian kings and archons, instead of Olympiads, may be surprising in a chronicle of panhellenic scope. However, the absence of the Olympiadic framework in the Parian Marble should not be understood as a rejection of a dominant system. The Olympiad system hardly became a standard for ancient historiography before the second century BCE, [58] and even after it was established, local lists of magistrates continued to be written and employed by officials, as well as by local historians all over the Greek-speaking world. The Athenian archon list, probably compiled and published by 420 BCE, may have been the only chronological system available to the author of the Parian Marble and his sources. [59] We shall return to this topic in Chapter 5, section 1 below.

While the Parian Marble uses as its diachronic axis a well-established system, namely, the Athenian archon list, its counting down to a year 1 is rather unusual. Herodotus uses his own present as a point of reference when speaking about the past, [60] but his expression “up to my own time” (ἐς ἐμέ) was not part of a systematic chronography. [61] And yet, from Jacoby on, many scholars have been satisfied by citing Herodotus for the Parian Marble’s count-down of years to a present date, whereas only two such instances are known among Greek chronographic materials: the Roman Chronicle (Chronicon Romanum) and the Getty Table (Getty Tabula). Although the latter was unknown to Jacoby, only these use the expression μέχρι τοῦδε (Chronicon Romanum col. A, line 31; Getty Tabula col. IIB, lines 6, 10, 18), which seems to suggest that the time of writing is taken as year 1 (I discuss these two chronicles in detail in Chapter 3, section 2 below).

Chronicles tend to be cumulative. In fact, ancient chronographic materials leave the impression that time is open, in the sense that lists could be, at least in principle, continued. A number of epigraphic eponymous lists and victor lists, where additions were made by different hands, illustrate this open quality. [62] In contrast, our inscription announces that it will end at a specific point in time. Thus, the Parian Marble has “closure,” as literary and historiographical works do. Whatever sources the author of the Parian Marble used, [63] he was the one who probably made the effort to convert chronographic references into intervals from the point of closure. Such efforts make sense if that point is meaningful: if, that is, the series of years ends with it and something new begins. [64] Is it possible that our chronicle marks the beginning of a chronographic era? Hazzard combined numismatic evidence with the Parian Marble in order to put forward precisely that argument. [65] Indeed, more than a hundred coins showing Ptolemy I’s head had for some time been understood as possibly marking an unknown era beginning between 265 and 255 BCE. [66] Hazzard suggests the Parian Marble points to the beginning of that era, which he denominates the “Soter Era,” an era that Ptolemy Philadelphos would have introduced in 263/62 BCE in order to commemorate his father. [67] This roughly coincides with the appearance of the expression “son of Ptolemy Soter” in legal documents that Ptolemy II issued from 259 BCE until the end of his reign. [68] Hazzard’s hypothesis was received with some skepticism among scholars, [69] and it cannot be confirmed without the end of the inscription. Yet support may be found, in addition to the numismatic evidence, in the Ptolemaic bias of the chronicle, already noted by Jacoby. [70] Moreover, Paros seems to have been under Ptolemaic government at the time, as a member of the League of the Islanders. [71]

Although the evidence is circumstantial, Hazzard’s hypothesis is the most plausible explanation for the Parian Marble’s chronographic system. The non-scholarly nature of the inscription precludes, in my view, direct Ptolemaic commission. [72] Still, the author may well have wanted to align himself with Ptolemaic ideology by combining political and cultural interests with a Ptolemaic chronographic framework, i.e. the newly established era. If the hypothesis of the Parian Marble using this era is rejected, we are left with the possibility that the author of the Parian Marble may have counted years down to an event of local interest that is now lost to us. [73]

5. The Location of the Parian Marble

Where was the stele containing the Parian Marble originally displayed? A certain answer to this question cannot be provided. [74] As I noted at the beginning of this chapter, there is no information on the finding of the inscription that might help us locate it in a specific archaeological site. I suggest that the unusual prominence of poets and musicians, which I discuss in detail in Chapter 6, indicates the type of location we should be looking for—one that is related to literary activities. We know of one such plausible location on the island of Paros, where other instances of monumental historiography have also been found. Indeed, in addition to the Parian Marble, Paros has yielded some of the earliest and more impressive instances of ancient Greek historical inscriptions. Two narratives on the life and work of Archilochus have come down to us: the Mnesiepes inscription and the Sosthenes inscription. Whereas the Sosthenes inscription (early first century BCE), has been known from 1900, the Mnesiepes inscription (third century BCE, Plates 7–8), [75] was only found half a century later. From the time it was discovered (1949) and published (1955), scholars have linked the Mnesiepes inscription to the Parian Marble. To begin with, the Parian Marble provides a suitable comparandum. Similarity of lettering with the Parian Marble supports the dating of the Mnesiepes inscription to the mid-third century BCE (Plate 9). [76] At the same time, the Mnesiepes inscription is suggestive of a plausible location for the Parian Marble. Indeed, both the Mnesiepes and the Sosthenes inscriptions were written on orthostats and were therefore part of walls, of a temenos or of a building. The nature of this site is illuminated by the Mnesiepes inscription itself. The text makes clear that it comes from an Archilocheion, a precinct built as a place to honor Archilochus along with Apollo, the Muses, and other gods:

Since Apollo declared these things, we call the place the Archilocheion and we set up altars and we sacrifice both to the gods and to Archilochus and we honor him in accordance with the god’s oracular response to us. [lines 16–19] [77]

The precise location of the Archilocheion is difficult to establish because of the dispersion and the secondary use of the remains. [78] However, we can attempt to understand the nature of the Archilocheion by comparison with other shrines named after poets. There was a building named Homereion in second-century BCE Delos. [79] In the same period, a gymnasion named Homereion is attested in Notion, near Colophon, [80] and later on in Chios too. [81] Smyrna had two gymnasia linked to the cult of poets: a Homereion [82] and a Mimnermeion. [83] In late third-century Thespiae, Hesiod was honored along with the Muses, [84] and a boundary stone mentions a religious association of Hesiodians, in relation to the cult of the Muses. [85] These testimonies indicate that shrines honoring poets in Hellenistic Greece, as other hero shrines, were linked to gymnasia and mouseia. [86] They strongly support the notion that the Archilocheion was an institution related to literary activities, namely a gymnasion or a mouseion, a hypothesis put forward by Kontoleon, which has elicited much scholarly agreement. [87] If the Archilocheion was such an institution, it could have been a place for classes, lectures, meetings, recitals, and perhaps even poetic contests, by local as well as by itinerant performers. [88] The shrine may have been maintained by a professional association, similar to the Hesiodians in Thespiae. Indeed, Mnesiepes’s use of plural verbs for the establishment of Archilochus’s cult suggests that he is a member of a group. Such a synodos or thiasos, as has been suggested, could be a guild of rhapsodes, [89] similar to the Homeridai, a guild that possibly claimed descent from Archilochus. As in other shrines, the Archilocheion may have guarded Archilochus’s works, [90] and it may have also housed a collection of books, as mouseia and gymnasia did. [91]

In such a place where the Muses and Archilochus were honored, where literary activities and meetings of an association of poets or rhapsodes may have taken place, where a collection of books was possibly kept and the results of literary research displayed, the Parian Marble would have been entirely in place.

Kontoleon’s hypothesis that the Parian Marble was displayed at the Archilocheion has been given serious scholarly consideration. [92] Chaniotis objected to it on several grounds, in particular, that the Parian Marble seems not to know Archilochus, while the Mnesiepes and the Sosthenes inscriptions celebrate him. [93] However, in the type of setting that we have reconstructed, the Parian Marble may have had a different purpose altogether: not to celebrate Archilochus, but to advertise the role of poets in history. Its purpose may have also been practical: a reference work for readers to consult. [94] Indeed, the complete layout of history in one stele may not have been significantly more difficult to consult than a papyrus roll. Still, whether or not the inscription was read from beginning to end, it had symbolic value nonetheless, as a visual representation of the reckoning of times past.

Given the state of our evidence, any answers to questions regarding the location of the Parian Marble remain speculative. [95] However, if it is granted that the Parian Marble was composed for display at the Archilocheion, and if this shrine was a site of literary learning, the large number of poets in the inscription certainly starts making sense.

Footnotes

[ back ] 1. The extant section A is 0.34 m high on the right side and 0.57 m high on the left side, 0.81–0.82 m wide and 0.12–0.15 m deep. Before the loss of the upper part, section A, comprising 93 lines, was 0.92 m high on the right and 1.13 m on the left (or perhaps higher, if it was not complete, as Jacoby suggested). Section B, 33 lines long, is 0.39 m at its highest. Considering that section B renders 38 years in 33 lines, that letters are about 8 mm high, and that there may have been a closing paragraph at the end, by a conservative computation at least 0.55 m are necessary for the missing 54 years. The complete stele was, therefore, a bit more than 2 m high (1.13 + 0.39 + 0.55 = 2.07 m). Section B is 0.83 m wide and 0.16 m deep (Krispi and Wilhelm 1897:183–184, IG XII.5 444, Jacoby 1904a:v). The Chronicle of Lindos (99 BCE), which is 2.37 m high, 0.85 m wide, and 0.32 m deep (Higbie 2003:6), can help us to visualize the Parian Marble when it was still complete. In terms of layout, a good parallel is the 250 BCE Delian inventory IG XI.2 287 B, a tall stele (2.18 m) with long lines (between 105 and 135 letters) and small lettering (7 mm, images available in Prêtre and Brunet 2002, plates VIII–XI).

[ back ] 2. Jacoby’s comment that the lettering of the inscription would suggest a date fifty years later than the terminus established by content (Jacoby 1904a:v and 1904b:90–91n1) was rejected by Wilhelm 1909:288n11 (see Rotstein 2014).

[ back ] 3. Lines are long, but the number of letters (110–130) in them is irregular (Jacoby 1904b:74, with a thorough analysis in his 1904 edition), as is the size of letters, with small ΘΟΩ (Dopp 1883:2–3, Jacoby 1904a:v) located in the middle of the line, and contrast in the width of broad letters (with Σ and Μ ca. 8 mm wide, Α and Η and N between 5 and 6 mm wide). The width of letters and the space between them is not regular.

[ back ] 4. On the use of an Athenian chronographic framework in local history, see Clarke 2008:213–214.

[ back ] 5. Jacoby 1904b:76–80, 102–104, FGrH 239 (commentary):666. Jacoby refers to the author as “the Parian,” and many have followed him.

[ back ] 7. Berranger 2000:115 emphasizes the provincial character of the author. The qualification of poetic victories as achieved “in Athens” without further details suggests composition for a non-Athenian audience, see chap. 6, sec. 2.IV below.

[ back ] 10. Different principles of time reckoning are applied before and after 399 BCE, see Jacoby 1904b:82–84 and FGrH II B pp. 668–671, Dinsmoor 1939:46, Cadoux 1948:83–86. Jacoby (1904b:89–91) believed that although chronographic deficiencies stood against the hypothesis of a professional chronographer or historian, the author was not simply an epitomizer, as had been suggested by Dopp 1883:7–8. Inconsistencies may result from the author’s drawing on multiple sources (Robert Cioffi, personal communication). Jacoby also noted the inattentive work of the cutter, whose mistakes are not always corrected (Jacoby 1904b). Text is written in erasures at A37, A38, A46, A47, A48, A49, A54, A59, B9.

[ back ] 16. Jacoby 1904b:101–102. There are, however, significant differences between the Parian Marble and Diogenes’s inscription, which was carved on a wall in short columns (letters between 1.8 cm and 3 cm tall) and included punctuation marks (paragraphoi and spaces). Thus, unlike the Parian Marble, the inscription of Diogenes of Oinoanda resembled a papyrus-roll (see Smith 1996 and 2003 for the text and further references).

[ back ] 17. For brief English accounts of the discovery and early editions, see Tod 1951:172–174, Connor 1990, Athanassakis 2001, Vickers 2006:6–13, 24–27, 38–40 (and the prefaces to Boeckh’s, Hiller von Gärtringen’s, and Jacoby’s editions). Liddel 2014:2-4, which came to my knowledge after completion of this book, examines the reception of the Parian Marble from its discovery to the mid-nineteenth century. I thank Christy Constantakopoulou for the reference.

[ back ] 18. The more famous one is the treaty between Smyrna and Magnesia (CIG 3137 = ISmyrna 573).

[ back ] 19. Selden 1628. Selden studied the inscriptions with the help of Patrick Young (royal librarian to King Charles I) and Richard James. Selden’s edition was published again in the same format in 1629.

[ back ] 23. Michaelis (1882:17) paraphrases Gassendi’s stories focusing on Selden. Gassendi is cited by Prideaux as a source, but Boeckh and later editors use the information without mentioning him. In his recent biography of John Selden, Toomer (2009:361) suspects that Petty actually bribed the local officials in Smyrna.

[ back ] 24. Samson is best known for the Truce of Treaty with Algiers in 1628. He was governor of the Bastion de France from 1630 until his death in 1633 (Miller 2005a:108–111 and 2005b:119–120).

[ back ] 27. “Supporting documentation seems not to have survived” (Miller 2005b:109).

[ back ] 28. Thomas Roe, ambassador in Constantinople, wrote to the Earl of Arundel that Petty “hath visited Pergamo, Samos, Ephesus, and some other places, where hee hath made your Lordship greate provisions, though hee lately wrote to mee he had found nothing worth” (20–30 October 1625).

[ back ] 32. Prideaux 1676:ix adds between brackets that the upper part was used to restore the palace’s fireplace (preface), but it is unclear how Prideaux acquired this information.

[ back ] 33. Already Dopp 1883 and Flach 1884 regretted the state of the Ashmolean section. They used a squeeze made by H. F. Pehlman (cf. IG XII.5 [p. 100]), now lost (Klaus Hallof, personal communication).

[ back ] 34. “Prideaux says in his preface that this fragment was used to repair a fireplace in Arundel House, presumably a marble chimney-piece. If so, it may yet be recovered, for such a piece of furniture would be likely to be removed entire, and the slab may have been made into a panel or shelf and still retain the inscription on its inner face” (Munro 1901a:149n1).

[ back ] 35. Prideaux 1676, Maittaire 1732, Chandler 1763 (Roberts 1791 reprinted the Greek inscriptions published by Chandler). I am grateful to the Houghton Library (Harvard University) for the opportunity to consult these early editions. The materials are also available online. They are, in principle, accessible to everybody, since copyrights expired long ago. But here we encounter a paradox of our current era. As digital technology advances and humanistic studies recede, accessibility is but an illusion. One still has to be able to read Latin to make use of them!

[ back ] 36. From Prideaux’s reading πρῶτος at A43, Connor (1990:28) infers that he must have seen the stone.

[ back ] 37. Prideaux includes notes and commentary by Selden and Thomas Lydiatus, as well as his own. Maittaire’s edition includes his own notes and commentary and those already included by Prideaux in his edition, adding those by Jacques Le Paulmier (written in 1668), John Marsham, Richard Bentley, and an Italian translation by Scipione Maffei.

[ back ] 39. Boeckh’s edition is held in high esteem. However, he himself did not inspect the stone, but used unpublished notes by Reinhold Forster, who may have seen it. Boeckh gives no details of the Berlin manuscript containing Forster’s notes, except that it was found in the Real Library of Berlin. Recovery of that manuscript would be an important contribution to the constitution of the Parian Marble’s text. Jacoby, at any rate, took Forster as an important witness to the lost fragment.

[ back ] 41. In the introduction to his IG edition, Hiller von Gärtringen acknowledges the help and erudition of Munro. He reports inspecting the Parian section in 1899 and spending five days examining the Ashmolean section together with Munro in October 1901.

[ back ] 42. Munro 1901a and 1901b. Of the edition Munro was preparing nothing is known. Many of his readings, not to be found in his 1901 articles (including information in erasures), have reached us through Hiller von Gärtringen’s notes. The IG archive does not hold any correspondence between the two.

[ back ] 44. The drawings of A2 and B provided by Hiller von Gärtringen and Jacoby 1904a:appendix 2 and 3 are probably based on the ones currently held at the IG archive in Berlin (Klaus Hallof, personal communication).

[ back ] 45. Jacoby was then in Berlin and seems to have counted on Hiller von Gärtringen’s advice, as well as that of Munro, with whom he corresponded (Jacoby 1904a:ix). Wilamowitz, to whom Jacoby dedicated his Das Marmor Parium, was his academic advisor; his readings must derive from personal communication. The IG archive holds a letter that Holleaux wrote to Jacoby on 3 November 1903, from which Jacoby derived a reading in line 57 (ὑποχείρον η͗σφαλίστο, A42). A sense of collaboration among scholars of different nationalities and ages emerges from the introductions to Hiller von Gärtringen’s and Jacoby’s editions. In turn, Munro 1905 and Dopp 1905 offer the perspective of senior scholars on the accomplishments of the young Jacoby.

[ back ] 54. Selden 1628:72 suggested Astyanax; Boeckh considered other alternatives, such as Euryanax and Polyanax. A prosopographic work by Berranger (2000:34, 168) takes Astyanax for granted. A Parian archon list was used by Demeas on his work on Archilochus; cf. the Sosthenes inscription, IG XII.5 445, line 9.

[ back ] 55. Diognetus is not attested elsewhere. The date 264/3, which depends on the assumption that the author was counting years exclusively (Cadoux 1948:83–86), is widely accepted (sometimes 263/2 is preferred, as in Hiller von Gärtringen’s edition and Hazzard 2000).

[ back ] 56. It has been argued that the year 1581/0 BCE may be the starting point of an alternative system of numbering Olympic games (Lämmer 1967, Christesen 2005:344–345n63). An inscribed discus dedicated at Olympia (IvO 240, 241) refers to the 255th Olympiad (= 241 CE) on one side, and to the 456th Olympiad (sic) on the other, implying two different starting points for the Olympic games, the usual one, 776 BCE, and another at 1581/0 BCE. An honorary inscription from Ephesus (CIG 2999 = IEph 1121, 245 CE) seems to use the same year as a starting point, if the corrected number is right (υνζ’ instead of υνε’). Ebert 1987, however, sets the mythical beginning of the Olympic games ca. 1,600 BCE. I am grateful to Klaus Hallof for these references.

[ back ] 57. The only reference to the present time appears in A5, where the place of the Amphictyons’ sacrifice (at Delphi, though it is not made explicit) is said to be the same “where they still sacrifice nowadays” (οὗ[περ] καὶ νῦν ἔτι θύουσιν Ἀμφικτύονες). We cannot say, however, whether the present time is that of the author or his sources.

[ back ] 58. The list of winners at the stadion in Olympia was compiled by Hippias of Elis in the late fifth century BCE. The numbers of the Olympiads were added in the early third century by Timaeus of Tauromenium, while Eratosthenes based his chronological system on it in the late third century (Christesen 2007:8-13, see chap. 3, sec. 1 below). Incidentally, the Olympic games are not mentioned in the extant text, even though the inscription refers to the most important panhellenic festivals (unless the beginnings of the Olympic games are considered to coincide with or antedate the opening of the chronicle, see n. 56 above). Hiller von Gärtringen supplemented a reference to Olympia in A17, Boeckh in A18.

[ back ] 62. For various hands in archon lists, see Bradeen 1963:198–200; for the Athenian Fasti and Didascaliae, see Millis and Olson 2012:5–6, 77, 134–135. On the general lack of closure in annals and chronicles, see White 1987.

[ back ] 63. On the sources of the Parian Marble, see Dopp 1983:5-42, Jacoby 1904a passim and 1904b:xi–xviii.

[ back ] 64. “What makes the year 264/3 so important?” asks Rosenberger. His answer—the Chremonidean War—is consistent with the interesting proposition that “the Marmor Parium was an attempt to establish the alliance between Athens and Alexandria by underlining the cultural importance of Athens in the Greek world, thus giving a historical-cultural explanation for a war against Macedonia” (Rosenberger 2008:230).

[ back ] 66. Mørkholm 1975–76:52, though he assigns the coins to an Aradian era. Lorber 2007 suggests that the era commemorated events unrelated to Ptolemy II.

[ back ] 67. Hazzard 2000:25–46. Hazzard dates year 1 of the Parian Marble to 263/2 BCE. The Soter Era would have begun in year 262 BCE, when the Great Ptolemaic procession was celebrated, to which the island league was invited.

[ back ] 69. Huss 2001:320–323, Chaniotis 2007. Hazzard’s conclusions seem to have been rejected especially because of his manipulation of dates for the Grand Procession to coincide with the proposed Soter Era (cf. Marquaille 2008:54 with further references). More sympathetic to Hazzard’s hypothesis is Ornaghi 2009:273–279.

[ back ] 72. A case for comparison is the Egyptian priest Manetho, who wrote a chronicle of the Egyptian dynasties that may have been partly inspired by Ptolemaic interests (cf. a dedication to Ptolemy Philadelphus reported by Syncellus pp. 40-41 Mosshammer, cf. Waddell 1956:208–211, which many consider the work of a pseudo-Manetho). Manetho’s fragments are available in Waddell 1956 and Verbrugghe and Wickersham 1996. For a comparison between Manetho and ancient Greek historiography, see Dillery 1999. I thank Jennifer Gates-Foster for suggesting the comparison.

[ back ] 74. Chaniotis 1988:102–112 points at the lack of evidence for the path followed in this section. His conclusions (p. 112) are very similar to those reached by Jacoby 1904b:101–102: namely, that the inscription was a private donation for display in a public place, either the agora or the foyer of a gymnasium, or in the sacred area of a temple. Chaniotis, however, rejected the possibility of a gymnasium.

[ back ] 76. Kontoleon’s dating (1952 [1955]:36, 1956:399 and 1964a:44, 46, 52–54) has never been challenged (cf. Peek 1955:5, Robert and Robert 1955:248, Parke 1958:90, SEG 15.517 (1958), Treu 1959:205, Clay 2004:12). The two inscriptions, however, were cut by two different letter-cutters. Lettering of the Parian Marble displays early Hellenistic characteristics: rather small round letters (Ο and Ω), a geometric aspect in letters with straight strokes (Σ, Δ, Η, Ε), and occasional curving of the straight verticals of E and M. The Mnesiepes inscription displays a bigger Ο and Θ, a bigger and more open Ω, the three usually aligned to the top of the line; more curving of straight verticals, minor signs of apicature, and the cross-bar of alpha slightly broken. All in all, the Mnesiepes inscription has a more regular lettering and less contrast between narrow and broad letters (Α and Λ six to seven mm wide, Σ five mm wide, Μ five to six mm wide, cf. three mm on the Parian Marble). Letters in the Mnesiepes inscription are one to two mm shorter than on the Parian Marble. See Rotstein 2014 for a fuller comparison of formal features in both inscriptions.

[ back ] 77. Translated by Gerber 1999:19. Hiller von Gärtringen postulated an Archilocheion on the basis of the Sosthenes inscription, before the discovery of the Mnesiepes inscription (IG XII.5 445). That both inscriptions refer to the same Archilocheion is the most reasonable assumption, though this need not coincide with an earlier burial place (see Clay 2004:35–38, with further references).

[ back ] 78. Perhaps the most attractive hypothesis is that of Ohnesorg (1982 and 2008), who reconstructed the architectural form of a fourth century BCE Doric temple, identified it as the Archilocheion, and suggested that it was originally located in the Elitas valley near the Tris Ekklesies. Clay 2004:36–38 proposed a location along the banks of the Elitas (see p. 123 for other possible locations).

[ back ] 85. IG VII 1785 (= SEG LIV 511), Tanagra, late third century BCE. The site may have been called Hesiodeion. See IG VII 4240, found near Thespiae for a stele dedicated to the Muses, where the personified Helicon gives an oracle regarding the blessings awaiting those who follow Hesiod’s teaching.

[ back ] 86. A long inscription from Thera provides the best example of a Mouseion including a shrine for hero cult, a provision of Epicteta for her husband and sons (IG XII.3 330, ca. 210–195 BCE). Similarly, a third-century inscription from Istria witnesses both cult and mouseion (IIstria 1, no. 1.15–26); cf. Fraser 1972:312–313, Clay 2004:72–74, with n83 for further references. On the cult of poets, see Clay 2004:63–98 and Kimmel 2008:547–675, with further references. Kimmel 2008:63–248 offers a useful collection of testimonies for Homer, Hesiod, Archilochus, Pindar, Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides.

[ back ] 87. Kontoleon 1952 [1955]:48-53, 1956, 1964a:51–52, and 1964b:200, Robert and Robert 1955:248 (favoring a mouseion rather than a gymnasion), Tarditi 1956:124, Treu 1959:205–207, Privitera 1966, Fraser 1972:313n57, Berranger 2000:114. Jacoby (1904b:102), who favored a gymnasium or the agora as possible locations for the Parian Marble, was not persuaded by the Mnesiepes inscription that the Parian Marble was set up in the Archilocheion (Jacoby 1955). See Chaniotis 1988:102–112 for arguments against the hypothesis that the Archilocheion was a gymnasion or mouseion.

[ back ] 88. Of the sort amply described in Hunter and Rutherford 2009. The cult of the Muses and, more specifically, mouseia were often associated with literary activities, such as recitals or poetic competitions; cf. Fraser 1972:313, Cameron 1995:24–70.

[ back ] 91. E.g. Demeas’s work on Paros and Archilochus, mentioned at the beginning of the Sosthenes inscription. It is possible that the Archilocheion kept not only the poems of Archilochus, but also a book collection. The most famous instance of a mouseion housing a library is, of course, that of Alexandria. Temples are known to have housed books (e.g. Pausanias 9.31.3–5, on Hesiod’s work), and this may have been the case of the Homereia (cf. Strabo 14.1.37) and the Mimnermeion. On book collections kept in Hellenistic gymnasia and libraries attached to gymnasia (e.g. at the Ptolemaeum in Athens, in Rhodes, Pergamon, Teos, Cos, and probably in Tauromenium), see Burzachechi 1963 and 1984, Nicolai 1987, Yegül 1992:7, 14–15, Scholz 2004:125–127, Ameling 2004:153–154 with n162.

[ back ] 93. Chaniotis 1988:102–112. Chaniotis rejected the notion that the Archilocheion was a gymnasion and that it was founded by an association of rhapsodes. Instead, he postulated that it was a hero-shrine established by a private fund. Consequently he objected to the thesis that the Parian Marble was displayed at the Archilocheion, for which, admittedly, there is no direct evidence. Following Jacoby 1904b:103, who was reluctant to link the Parian Marble to the Archilocheion (FGrH 502), even after the discovery of the Mnesiepes inscription (Jacoby 1955), Chaniotis favors the hypothesis of display at a public place such as the agora (though Jacoby considered a gymnasion a possible location).

[ back ] 94. Niese 1888:95 suggested the work was set up for use at a school (contra Chaniotis 1988:111).

[ back ] 95. The issue partly depends on the perception of similarities and differences with other types of inscriptions, such as the Tabulae Iliacae (see chap. 3, sec. 2 below) and the Athenian record of dramatic performance (see chap. 6, sec. 1, 2.IV below).

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